This Might Hurt opens on a shocking, perhaps even horrifying note with what appears to be an extreme piece of performance art. It was pretty cringe-inducing for me, and I’d say skip it if you’re squeamish, but it does serve a purpose to the story.

From there, we follow two sisters, Natalie and Kit, dealing very differently with the death of their mother. Decisive, strong Natalie throws herself into her work. Mild, discontented Kit has taken off for a six-month self-improvement stay at Wisewood, forgoing contact with the outside world so she can try to figure out if there’s more to life. Natalie receives a mysterious email from within Wisewood implying that a long-held secret will be revealed to Kit if Natalie doesn’t tell her first. Will she sort things out with her sister? What is the secret she’s hiding? Can she persuade Kit to leave the clinging embrace of Wisewood? Grab the book and see for yourself.

When I read the blurb, I wanted to read this book. I am a sucker for a good suspense novel, and this one sounded like it fit the bill. It didn’t quite live up to my hopes for it, though.

The story unfolds from three different viewpoints: Natalie’s, an unknown woman’s, and Kit’s (which felt like it took a long time to surface in the book). I first took the unknown woman to be either Natalie or Kit, but then there were references to her sister Jack. That made the unknown woman’s narratives fairly confusing to me, as I couldn’t figure out who she was for a good chunk of the book.

Some of the topics covered in the book, centering around the unknown woman, make for hard reading. Her father is horribly abusive and controlling, making her earn points to pretty much do anything – I mean, she has to earn points to sleep. It is her father’s abuse that pushes her to pursue a life of learning to face and conquer her fears, and to pursue a career in magic, and later mentalism, against his express wishes. The sections describing her interactions with Sir, as she calls her father, are deeply disturbing to read, and the descriptions of the extent to which she takes her performances are also sometimes difficult.

And when we got to the big reveal of the secret, it was a little bit of a letdown. I mean, Natalie says about the secret, “I have no idea what Kit will do when she finds out,” so the reader is expecting something earth-shattering, devastating, shocking. Given the circumstances in which the secret took place, it wasn’t that big of a shock to me. I wasn’t gobsmacked. It seemed like a pretty shallow root to bring forth Natalie’s huge fear of Kit finding out.

Wrobel’s writing style is easy to read, and she does a good job of drawing out compassion for our characters, even though none of them are terribly likeable. The book was good, it just wasn’t what I’d hoped. If you like a story that examines how far people will go to master their fears, that gives off a creepy vibe that has you resisting the urge to look over your shoulder, This Might Hurt may be perfect for you.

This book has a lot of story to it. I wasn't sure if I was going to finish this book after the first few chapters. The mistreatment of children isn't really something I want to read. The book focuses on some less than perfect characters who wind up on the same island with a cult like leader. How they each got where there is chronicled but confusing at times. I'm not sure if all readers had the same problem thinking the narrative of one character was actually that of another but I think that is what makes this book so entertaining.

Dim the lights because the show is about to start...

I couldn't spend 6 months without contact with the outside world, but when you're desperate for change or for starting over, a reset like this might just be something you're willing to do. Some might even call Wisewood a spiritual retreat of sorts... However, after reading this, I'm going to affectionately call it Hell. Kit clearly doesn't agree since she voluntarily signed up for this "adventure".

What blows my mind is that when Natalie receives a threatening call from Hell, I mean Wisewood, threatening to expose her secrets to her sister, Natalie rushes up the coast to this private island to expose herself to her sister first... It's not like the island is alive or anything, but the people running the show are definitely pulling the strings.

In a twisty, creepy psychologically thrilling way, I really enjoyed this book. Think summer camp with a sick twist... There was also a book by Emily Carpenter that this reminded me of so if you also enjoy This Might Hurt, look her up as well.

Sadly, this one missed the mark for me. While I enjoyed the plotline and subject matter (loved the magic/mentalist aspect which I found fascinating), I think the way it was told was unnecessarily confusing. I thought it might just be me, but after I had finished I went and checked other reviews and found that quite a few others seemed to have the same issue. There are three points of view - the chapters for Nat and Kit are very clearly pointed out. Then there is a third narrator, but I didn't think it was presented clearly. For the longest time, I thought that third point of view was still attributed to Nat and I kept finding inconsistencies such as "I thought she was the younger sister, but it seems like she's now the older sister". So maybe that was done on purpose as part of the mystery, but I don't like being that confused or having to work that hard to understand a story. I don't mind that "what the hell is going on here" thing, but this was "WHAT the HELL is going on here" - totally different emphasis! No matter, Stephanie Wrobel writes fantastic warped characters , and that's no different here. I'll be sure to tune in for more of her work.

This Might Hurt introduces us to two sisters named Natalie and Kit and we learn that they have drifted apart and that Nat has been keeping secrets from Kit that could damage their relationship. Nat has always been her little sister Kit's savior when it comes to naive choices and all of a sudden she learns that Kit has given up her steady job and life to head to a retreat on a private island called Wisewood. She is supposed to spend 6 months there where she is supposed to spend time away from the rest of the world. Nat of course is concerned for her younger sister and that concern grows when she receives an email threatening to tell Kit the secret that Nat has been keeping from her for years. Obviously, Nat rushes to Wisewood in order to confess to Kit before she hears it from someone else but she discovers that the island far worse than she feared.

This was super creepy and the Wisewood had a lot of cultish feels that had me at the edge of my seat while reading. I was terrified for both sister while reading this and had fun trying to unravel what was going on throughout the book. The author did a great job keeping me in suspense until the end of the book where everything started to make sense. I did enjoy the story and creepy atmosphere, but I was a little confused at times what narrator was talking at certain parts in the book and the timeline with one of the narrator was even more confusing. I thought the story itself was well written and the main female characters were fascinating and once I figured out their pasts and the reasons behind what they had done it all fell into place. After reading this book I definitely will be reading more about cult centric books and I'll be sure not to sign up for any weird retreats.

Thank you to Berkley Publishing Group/NetGalley for the digital review copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

I enjoyed this book, though it’s much less of a thriller than the promotional materials make it out to be. Instead, I’d view this book as a deep character study into the backgrounds of these women, all of whom have deep trauma. The alternating viewpoints can be a bit confusing, and to be honest I don’t think the “reveal” of the identity of one of the narrators is worth the confusion—go ahead, look at the spoilers. The conclusion was a total rush and has been sitting with me in the week or so since I finished.

I found this one somewhat hard to follow. There weren’t really any characters that were endearing at all and I felt that it was full of a lot of bad actors. The whole cultish vibe is normally my jam but this one wasn’t my fave. Overall it was still a decent read and kept me engaged mostly but it didn’t blow my skirt up.

This is a hard book for me to review. I enjoyed most of it, but There were some pieces I didn’t care for. I didn’t find the identity of the third perspective very mysterious and overall I didn’t think this book was all that thrilling. It is a story about a cult with cult like behaviors and the family member trying to save someone caught into the cult. It’s a story that’s been told. I will say the story of how the cult leader became what she is was fairly interesting but also disturbing at times. I had a hard time connecting to Natalie and Kit and therefore didn’t care as much about their stories. I was also underwhelmed with the secret that Natalie traveled to Wisewood to confess to Kit before someone else told her. Overall I give it a 3.5 rounded up for star selection because I did like the writing.

This is not a book for the faint of heart, as made evident by the opening pages.

It is a really well-written book, keeping you just on the edge of figuring things out until Wrobel is ready for the foreshadowing to come together brilliantly.

Wisewood promises participants that if they commit to a six month stay without technology, that they will teach them how to truly be fearless. But Natalie has received an email that fills her with fear-that someone on Wisewood, where her sister Kit is currently living, is going to tell Kit a secret about Natalie that will absolutely shatter them both. So Nat sets out to get into Wisewood, find her sister, and tell her herself. But nothing is what it seems, including Wisewood itself.

I have to admit, when I realized what was really going on within the story, I gasped out loud and actually clapped my hands, I was so pleased by Wrobel's cleverness. While there are definitely some parts that can be hard to read, this book is well worth that read.

I'd say the only relationship as complicated as a mother and daughter is sisters. Both have the potential for absolute love and hatred. THIS MIGHT HURT (Berkley) by Stephanie Wrobel explores the bonds of sisterhood threatened by a cult.

Two sisters, Natalie and Kit are raised in the same family by a sadistic father and passive mother. To say they are both damaged is an understatement. They haven't talked in months, since Kit went off the grid to a secluded island off the coast of Maine and joined the self-help group, Wisewood. Wisewood promises to "maximize selves" through some very controversial techniques. Huh? Exactly. When Natalie receives an unnerving email about secrets between the she thinks something isn't right and she leaves Boston for Maine. There is no welcome wagon when she arrives.

After being kept by group leaders from seeing Kit, Natalie is finally reunited with her sister and what can go wrong, goes very wrong. Kit is no longer the little sister who used to hang on Natalie's every word. Natalie finds the whole "Maximizing Selves," which Kit has embraced, nothing but brainwashing and she lets her know.

The twists and turns kept me guessing to the very end. I was actually surprised by the finish, which was quite refreshing. THIS MIGHT HURT takes readers into psychological abuse, manipulation and the long lasting emotional and mental tolls people experience when they become part of a cult.

All Natalie wants is to take her sister, Kit back to civilization, but she finds resistance at every turn. This suspenseful novel finishes with an unforeseen conclusion.

This book fell flat for me. I was super excited to read it because I love reading about cults which is the theme of this book. Unfortunately this book flipped back and forth between two different stories and all different time lines and became way too confusing for me. It was also extremely slow. It took 75% into the book to finally figure out who this second person was and by that point I really didn’t care. I wish this would have been more fast paced with more in depth characters so I could actually tell them apart.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing me this ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book is great! Would definitely recommend. Thanks so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

UGH. I’m so conflicted because I loved this book until the ending. The ending fell flat for me. It was rushed and incomplete. There are various timelines and we have three point of views, which I love. I didn’t mind the slow burn, but I had hope that the ending would make up for it, which it didn’t (at least not for me).

This was the first “cult” book I’ve read and it did not disappoint! I loved the multiple timelines and even though I was confused who I was reading about at first, when I figured that twist out, it was quite the revelation! I loved the character development and the mystery mixed in with the cult setting. Overall, this was a great read and I look forward to more books by Stephanie Wrobel.l!

Told from the point of view of two sisters as we learn of their past, family history and desires. One career driven and accomplished while the other is searching for purpose and community. Mysterious and edgy.

**I received an electronic ARC from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review of this book.

What did I just read?

I’m not sure what I was expecting. From the description maybe a fast paced thriller but this was much more a slow burn.,

I kept trying to guess the twist (which I’m usually pretty good at seeing). These twists ended up being more a dawning then bam twist!

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for allowing me to read and review this book.

This story fell a bit flat. It was slow and the conclusion was mediocre. Since this is classified as a thriller, I was expecting more excitement at the end.

After seeing so many mixed reviews for this one, I’ll admit I was a little hesitant to finally pick this one up after being approved months ago-but damn was I glad I did! I think if anything this book falls victim to readers having incorrect assumptions going into it; it’s a cult-y mystery story about what happens to two sisters when one lives in a cult and the other lives in her own lifetime web of lies. I highly enjoy books with a cult premise and this one was no different, highly recommend picking this one up!

Thank you NetGalley and Berkeley Books for providing me with an ARC!

I loved Darling Rose Gold and was really excited to read this one as an electronic advanced reader copy. However, I had to give up on it halfway through because of the alternating POVs and the character names appeared to change between childhood and adulthood. I was getting terribly confused remembering whose point of view I left off reading. Otherwise, the book was intriguing enough that I might finish it after publication in print when I am able to flip back and forth easily.

This Might Hurt is Stephanie Wrobel’s second novel. I loved Stephanie’s debut, Darling Rose Gold, so I was excited to hear about this one! This Might Hurt is a thriller that explores strained family dynamics, claustrophobic vibes, island life, and instinct. The author addresses some heavy subjects throughout the story: child abuse, domestic abuse, emotional abuse. The premise of the story was intriguing. I found this to give Nine Perfect Strangers and cult like vibes which was interesting. It was interesting to see the secrets unravel for each character and to learn more about their pasts. Though I figured out most of the twists early on, there was a small one that I didn’t catch that was pleasantly surprising. I liked the way the book ended as well. I could definitely see this book have a sequel or turn into a show. This Might Hurt was a fun read, but I personally like Darling Rose Gold even though I rated both books the same. I’d recommend picking this one up if you liked Darling Rose Gold!